Watch: Mark E. Smith chats Beckham, bombs and the IRA

Vice’s VBS.tv comes through with more televisual alchemy. Today sees the launch of Soft Focus UK; a new series of interviews that sees ex-Nation of Ulysses man Ian Svenonius “clamber over the briny rocks that make up the British Isles to interrogate the great minds of English pop and rock’n’roll music”.

Interviewees draw weighty ranks - Penny Rimbaud of Crass; Bobby Gillespie of Primal Scream; Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine; Billy Childish; Terry Hall of The Specials; Shaun Ryder of Happy Mondays and Graham Coxon out of Blur.

First in the series, though, is Mark E. Smith; of Von Sudenfed and The Fall, of course. See below for the first episode in a five-piece chat that’ll run per day like a lairy hound over the rest of this week.